


Rise To Glory

by AndiMackmeetsHamilton



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst, First Kiss, Fluff and Angst, M/M, Out of Character, Short One Shot, Teen Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-14
Updated: 2019-04-14
Packaged: 2020-01-13 04:33:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 842
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18461567
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AndiMackmeetsHamilton/pseuds/AndiMackmeetsHamilton
Summary: Short one shot. Dumbledore steps through the Pensieve. It takes him back to the summer he and Gellert Grindewald fell in love, just as Grindewald finds his rise to glory."Which will you choose, Gellert....power, or love?"





	Rise To Glory

**Author's Note:**

> This is probably rubbish as I've never written HP fanfiction before but enjoy! It does have a canon divergence in when and how they met and is OOC but if you like it tell me (:

Albus Dumbledore sighed, rubbing his temple. He had yet another migraine tonight. But that wasn't the only thing keeping him awake. His memories of his younger days often taunted him. Sighing, Dumbledore resigned himself to another sleepless fate and stepped into his Pensieve, watching his memories replay like an old movie. 

.........................................................................................  
It was the summer holidays, and Albus Dumbeldore was sixteen years old.

Albus swung his legs casually, peering down at the rushing river below him, before returning to his book. A few seconds later, a wave of icy water spiked upwards, hitting him in the face. He gasped and heard a familiar laugh behind him, almost falling out of the tree he occupied. 

His heart beat sped up.

"Not funny, Grindewald." 

"I thought it was, Dumb bell door." 

"I told you not to pronounce my surname like that. " 

"You're the one who referred to me by my last name. " 

Albus shrugged. 

"You're the one who frightened me like that. "

Gellert grinned. 

"You should have seen your face!" 

Albus shook his head and returned to his book, which the other boy promptly threw out of his hand. 

"Hey! I was reading that!" 

"I hadn't noticed." 

With one flourish, Gellert spun the book around repeatedly, whizzing it round and round. Gellert snapped his fingers and returned it to Albus.

"Is that...?" He trailed off. Gellert nodded. 

"The Book of Honesty." He finished of for him. "Yes. It is."

Albus stared at Gellert in awe. 

"How did you do that?" 

Grindewald tapped the end of his nose wisely. 

"Magic. " 

Dumbledore rolled his eyes and flicked through it. Legend had it, when you were gifted the book of magic, letters appeared sporadically on different pages. 

"On Page 2, it says T. Page 4, H. Page 6, E. Page 8, O. Page 10, N. Page 12, E. Page 14, W. Page 16, H. Page 18, O. Page 20, G. Page 22, A. Page 24, V. Page 26, E. Page 28, Y. Page 30, O. Page 32, U. Page 34, T. Page 36, H. Page 38, I. Page 40, S. Page 42, I. Page 44, S. Page 46, G. Page 48, A. Page 50, Y." 

Albus frowned as he strung together the letters. Gellert's eyes widened with fear as he realised what the message proclaimed and how he couldn't take the book back as it was against magical law. He turned red and Albus looked straight at him. 

"You're...gay? As in, homosexual?" 

Gellert scratched his back uncertainly, feeling slightly uncomfortable. 

"I-" He sighed. "Yes. I suppose so." 

Albus stared at him intently for a second, eyes widened by surprise. 

Meanwhile, older Dumbeldore chuckled. It wouldn't be until two months later when he would realise that the message in fact hadn't ended there, and continued to spell out: 'And he is madly in love with you' from pages 52-100. 

100 pages, declaring Grindewald's love for him. 

Dumbledore's heart twanged with guilt, but he chose to push it down and watch the next memory play out, which happened to be approximately 2 weeks later.

"Have you ever kissed anybody before?" 

The question came from Gellert, who was sat comfortably in the tree next to Albus, who shook his head. 

"No." He paused. "Have you?" 

Gellert shook his head. 

"No. I haven't either." He took a deep breath. "But," he articulated, "this image keeps haunting my dreams and I can't get it out of my mind." 

He closed his eyes in concentration and waved his hand about in the direction of the river, which seemed to obey his every command. 

Albus glanced at the river. The image was of two boys kissing. Upon further inspection, it seemed.... 

"That's us, isn't it?" he asked Gellert, who nodded slowly with his eyes closed, a solitary tear escaping from his eyes. 

"Yes." 

"Would you like to try it?" Albus asked. 

Gellert opened his eyes in shock.

"What?" 

"Kissing. Together. You and I. Just to see what's it like." 

"Are you sure about that?" 

Albus considered it, heart racing. 

"Yes. "

Gellert approached him shyly, and cupped Albus' chin in his hands, before kissing him. 

Despite both boys' magical expertise and vast, seemingly inexhaustible knowledge about wizardry and magic, neither of them felt like they had known true magic until now. It was like the time Daisy Green had let off one hundred fireworks at the same time, only a lot less disastrous and a lot more romantic. They pulled away for breath and pressed their foreheads together.

This sweet image warped suddenly into darker, scarier memories, a thousand arguments blending simultaneously into one. One statement older Dumbeldore managed to catch was the one that has been troubling him for days. 

Or perhaps it had been troubling him for 100 years now, since the fateful day of his 17th birthday, Dumbledore realised as he emerged from the Pensieve

"Which will you choose, Gellert...power, or love?" 

Grindewald had made his decision that day. From then on, he was unstoppable. 

Nobody could get in the way of Grindewald's Rise to Glory. 

And they never did.

**Author's Note:**

> Sorry it's short, don't forget to comment and tell me what you think! (:


End file.
